Enfilade

From Colonial Williamsburg:

Clay Stories: A Ceramics Symposium

Online and in-person, Colonial Williamsburg, 4–6 June 2026

Colonial Williamsburg is pleased to host the 2026 bi-annual ceramics conference, in collaboration with the Museum of Early Southern Decorative Arts (MESDA), for this year’s symposium entitled Clay Stories. Every object has multiple stories layered through time as it passes from raw materials in the hands of makers, to finished vessel, to single owner or multiple stewards, and from useful utilitarian piece to archaeological fragment or prized possession mounted in a collector’s curio cabinet or in a museum’s case. Clay Stories weaves together history and research shared by curators, scholars, archaeologists, and potters.

All lecture presentations will be available on the conference streaming platform for both virtual and in-person registrants through 31 August 2026. Virtual attendees have virtual access to all lectures.

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12.00  Registration

1.00–6.00  Pre-Conference Bus Tour: Following the Dragon
Generously supported by James D. and Pamela J. Penny

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9.30–3.30  Pre-Conference Workshops and Tours
Please visit the pre-conference options page for more details.

4.30  Welcome

4.45  Glories and the Unexpected: Remarkable Ceramics in American Collections — Errol Manners (Independent Arts Dealer)

5.30  Treasure in Jars of Clay: Discovering Ceramic Masterworks in Unlikely Settings — Luke Zipp (Curator and Author, Crocker Farm)

6.15  Opening Reception

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8.30  Announcements and Updates from Colonial Williamsburg and MESDA — Angelika Kuettner (Curator of Ceramics and Glass, Colonial Williamsburg) and Johanna Brown (Chief Curator and Director of Collections, Old Salem)

8.45  Ceramics from England to Jamestown to Williamsburg — Julie Edwards (Archaeological Officer, Cheshire West and Chester Council)

9.30  Coffee Break

10.15  A ‘Magical Mystery Tour’, or the Life and Travels of a Curator —Leslie Grigsby (Emerita Senior Curator of Ceramics and Glass, Winterthur)

10.45  Jack and Acton: Revealing the Contributions and Presence of Enslaved Potters in the 18th-Century Red Earthenware Industry of Charlestown, MA. — Joe Bagley (City Archaeologist and Director of Archaeology, Boston Archaeology Program)

11.15  Bonnin and Morris: New Discoveries in Philadelphia — Melissa and Matt Dumphy (Citizen Archaeologists)

11.45  Philadelphia Slipware in Context — Debbie Miller (Archeologist and Curator, National Park Service)
Lecture Supported by the Chipstone Foundation (Ceramic in America)

12.15  Lunch Break

2.15  From Hubener to Medinger: Redware Potters of Southeastern Pennsylvania — Lisa Minardi (Editor, Americana Insights)

2.45  Midwestern Harvest Jugs: An Expression of Personal Choice — Wes Cowan (Vice Chair Emeritus, Freeman’s Auction House and Founder, Cowan’s Auctions)

3.15  ‘The Prospects of Obtaining Wealth with Ease’: The Ceramic Assemblage of 17th-Century Drayton Hall — Luke Pecoraro (Director of Archaeology and Collections, Drayton Hall Preservation Trust)

3.45  Coffee Break

4.30  RE-coiling and Master Potter David Drake — Michelle Erickson (Independent Artist)
Presentation supported by Jeffrey S. Evans & Associates

5.30  Closing Remarks — Tom Savage (Director of Educational Conferences and Travel, Colonial Williamsburg

6.00  Closing Reception with Live Entertainment at Shields Tavern

Imperial Wine Cups: Gold Cups of Eternal Stability 金甌永固杯, 1740–41 (Qing dynasty, Qianlong period), gold, kingfisher feathers, pearls, sapphires, spinels, tourmalines, carnelian, quartz, chrysoberyl, lapis, turquoise, ivory, mother of pearl and wood; 18 cm high, including stand (London: Wallace Collection, W112 / W113).

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This year’s Haughton International Seminar:

Courtly Magnificence: Gender, Dynasty, and Politics

The British Academy, 11 Carlton House Terrace, London, 24–25 June 2026

Addressing topics ranging from the royal courts of the Middle Ages to those of the 20th century, this seminar will look at how some of the world’s greatest art collections were formed. It will explore how political intrigue and power were involved in their accumulation and how the personalities of these royal collectors—women as much as men—were reflected in their collections.

Two-day seminar: £140
Two-day seminar including a champagne reception and dinner at The Athenaeum on Wednesday, 24th: £230
Student tickets for two-day seminar (on production of ID): £60

p r e s e n t a t i o n s

• Silvia Davoli — Thinking outside the Court: Horace Walpole, Prince of Strawberry Hill
• Lisa Skogh de Zoete — A Family Network of Collectors: Maria Eleonora of Brandenburg, Christina of Sweden, and Hedwig Eleonora of Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorp
• Mia Jackson — Madame de Pompadour: Love, Friendship, and the Arts
• Rose Kerr — Collections of the Forbidden City
• Tim Knox — China Queens: 20th-Century Royal Collectors of Porcelain
• Caroline McCaffrey-Howarth — Our Ceramic Chasse’: The Exceptional Legacy of Lady Charlotte Schreiber
• Lara Virginie Pitteloud — An Imperial ‘Gluttony’: Art Collecting and the Self-Fashioning of Catherine II’s Court
• Ivan Day and Timothy Schroder — Service a la Francaise
• Christopher (Kit) Maxwell — Staging the Past: The Thorne Miniature Rooms and the Theatre of Historic Interiors
• Timothy Wilson — The Earliest Royal Maiolica Commission: The Service for Matthias Corvinus, King of Hungary, and His Wife Beatrice of Aragon
• Catriona Seth— Virtuous Circulations? Maria Theresa and Marie Antoinette’s Family Portraits
• Claudia Wagner — Collecting Intaglios: Princes as Scholars

Today and tomorrow at the Villa Medici, from the conference programme:

Diplomatic Gifts in the Modern and Contemporary Periods

L’Académie de France à Rome, 2–3 March 2026

Organized by Alessandro Gallicchio, Valentina Hristova, and Natacha Pernac

Attributed to Bishandas, Jahangir Entertains Shah Abbas, from the St. Petersburg Album, ca. 1618 (Washington DC, Freer Gallery of Art).

On March 2–3, 2026, the French Academy in Rome – Villa Medici will host an international symposium dedicated to diplomatic gifts in the modern and contemporary periods, examined in terms of their definitions, transformations, and processes of heritage-making on a global scale. These ‘ambassador objects’ will be studied in their material, political, and symbolic dimensions, as well as in their role in shaping international relations and ritualizing exchanges. Adopting polycentric perspectives, the conference encourages cross-views and bilateral or multilateral analysis of the sources.

Organizing Committee
• Alessandro Gallicchio, Director of the Department of Art History, Académie de France à Rome – Villa Médicis
• Valentina Hristova, senior lecturer in History of Modern Art, Université de Picardie Jules Verne, Amiens
• Natacha Pernac, senior lecturer in History of Modern Art, Université Paris-Nanterre

Scientific Committee
• Lucien Bély, professor emeritus of modern history, Paris, Sorbonne University, member of the Institut, Académie des sciences morales et politiques
• Francesco Freddolini, Associate professor of modern art history, Rome, Sapienza – University of Rome
• Serge Gruzinski, Director Emeritus of Historical Research, Paris, CNRS / EHESS
• Guido Guerzoni, historian and economist, Milan, Luigi Bocconi University
• Mei Mei Rado, assistant professor of Textile and Dress History, New York, Bard Graduate Center

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9:00  Accueil

9.30  Ouverture — Sam Stourdzé et Alessandro Gallicchio (Académie de France à Rome – Villa Médicis)

Introduction — Valentina Hristova (Université de Picardie Jules-Verne, Amiens) et Natacha Pernac (Université Paris-Nanterre)

10.00  Les Définitions en Question
Présidence de session: Valentina Hristova
• Sur les dons (réels ou imaginaires) d’Uzun Hasan à l’État vénitien — Matthew Gillman (Columbia University, NY)
• Une collection des tranchées: Les œuvres découvertes par l’Armée française d’Orient au Louvre. Don diplomatique
ou butin de guerre? — Violette Gautier (Université de Picardie Jules-Verne, Amiens)
• Between Transnational Production and Cultural Diplomacy: Making and Managing Chinese Gardens Overseas — Zeming Taro Cai (University of Toronto)

11.30  Pause café

11.45  Récits Croisés, Sources et Représentations en Regard
Présidence de session: Francesco Freddolini
• Les cadeaux diplomatiques entre Empire ottoman et souverains occidentaux au XVIe siècle. Peut-on parler de réciprocité? — Frédéric Hitzel (EHESS, CETOBaC, Paris)
• The Geography of Diplomatic Gifts: Gift Giving and the Diverse Gift Profiles of State Ambassadors in 18th-Century Ottoman Diplomatic Ceremonial — Hümeyra Şahin Oktay (İstanbul Üniversitesi / Tobb Üniversitesi, Ankara)

12.40  Pause déjeuner

14.15  Les Vies de l’Objet: Fabrication, Reception, Display
Présidence de session: Guido Guerzoni
• « Que lui avions-nous apporté ? » : Les déboires des cadeaux diplomatiques du Portugal au souverain éthiopien Lebna Dengel, 1515–20 — Alain Mathilde (Université de Grenoble Alpes)
• Versailles et le monde: Les présents de Louis XV, 1715–74 — Marie-Laure Buku Pongo (Frick Collection, NY)
• Crafting Diplomacy: Extraordinary Embassies’ Visits to the Gobelins Manufacture and the Garde-Meuble de la Couronne, 1662–1789 — Barbara Lasic (Sotheby’s Institute of Art, Londres)

15.45  Pause café

16.00  Les Vies de l’Objet: Patrimonialisation
Présidence de session: Natacha Pernac
• Représentation et patrimonialisation des visites et dons diplomatiques en un haut lieu militaire, de l’Hôtel des Invalides au musée de l’Armée, 1675–2025 — Sylvie Le Ray-Burimi (Musée de l’Armée, Paris)
• The Qing Empire’s Gift to the Permanent Court of Arbitration: Transforming the Logic of Gift-Giving in Late Qing Diplomacy, 1907–11 — Yuxuan Zhou (Université de Genève)
• Le musée Senghor, une vitrine de la diplomatie culturelle du Sénégal, 1960–80 — Mohamadou M. Dieye (Musée d’art africain Théodore Monod, École doctorale ETHOS, Dakar)

17.30  Pause café

17.45  Special Lecture
• French Diplomatic Gifts in the Shaping of Qing Imperial Arts during the Long 18th Century — Mei Mei Rado (Bard Graduate Center, NY)

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9.00  Accueil

9.30  Stratégies et Politique des Dons Diplomatiques (Temps Long / Sérialité)
Présidence de session: Lucien Bély
• Entre jeux d’échelles et variété des typologies: Les cadeaux diplomatiques des Médicis et des Este au second Cinquecento — André Rocco (Université de Liège)
• Les dons cycliques de « pietra dura » entre l’Inde et l’Italie, 1620–2020: Entre charge historique et enjeux de supériorité — Lola Cindric (EHESS, Paris)
• Giulio Rospigliosi and Pascual de Aragón: The Role of Gifts in Relations between Madrid and Rome and Their American Projection — Carrio Invernizzi Diana (UNED, Madrid)
• Dono Dedimus Sacrum Corpus Christi Martyris, Corpisanti as Diplomatic Gifts from the Holy See to Mexico, 1833–60 — Montserrat A. Báez Hernández (Università di Teramo, KU Leuven)

11:45  Pause café

12:00  Special Lecture
• Du Japon à Madrid via México: Mondialisation, chocs des cultures et dons diplomatiques au sein de la Monarchie catholique, 1580–1640 — Serge Gruzinski (CNRS, EHESS, Paris)

12.45  Pause déjeuner

HECAA events at this year’s CAA conference, with a full listing of panels available here. And please feel free to add additional talks and sessions in the comments section below. –CH

114th Annual Conference of the College Art Association

Hilton Chicago, 18–21 February 2026

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9:00–10:30am | Hilton Chicago—3rd Floor—Marquette Room
Hybridity, Adaptability, and Exchange during the Long Eighteenth Century: Producing Global Aesthetics in Decorative Art and Design (HECAA session)
Chaired by Zifeng Zhao and Alisha Ma
• From Senegal to Parisian Salons: The Shiny Invisibility of Gum Arabic — Carole Nataf (Courtauld Institute)
• Versailles in Beijing: French ‘Cabinet du Roi’ Prints in Late Seventeenth-Century Qing Court and Society — Niko Ruijia Ma (KU Leuven)
• Sugarcoating Colonial Violence: Material Culture and Courtly Displays of Sugar in Ancien Régime France, 1670–1730 — Loïc Derrien (Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum)
• Global Encounters: Imported Chintz in Early Modern Japan — Vidhita Raina (Colorado State University)

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Join HECAA members for lunch on Friday! Catch up with other HECAA members over a buy-your-own lunch at a nearby restaurant. The group will meet at the lobby of the Hilton Chicago between 12:45 and 1:00. Please be in touch with Sarah Lund (hecaa.emergingscholarsrep@gmail.com) so we can know how many people to expect.

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2:30–4:00pm | Hilton Chicago—3rd Floor—Waldorf Room
Bad Government: Art and Politics in the Eighteenth Century (ASECS session)
Chaired by Amy Freund
• Liberty and Death — David Ehrenpreis (James Madison University)
• Risky Business: Female Artists and High-Stakes Print during the French Revolution — Sarah Lund (Harvard University)
• Sketching Fragile Authority: Pierre Eugène du Simitière and Revolutionary Visual Culture — Megan Baker (University of Delaware)
• The Art of Revolutionary Colonialism: Drawing and the Orientalist Guillotine in French-Occupied Egypt — Thadeus Dowad (Northwestern University)

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Note (added 10 February 2026) — There are plenty of other talks and panels worth noting (and please feel free to add them below!), but I especially want to highlight this session sponsored by the Historians of British Art. –CH

Thursday, 19 February, 9:00–10:30am | Hilton Chicago—8th Floor— Lake Erie
Let’s Get Metaphysical: Rethinking the Empiricism of British Art (HBA session)
Chaired by Douglas Fordham
• C. Oliver O’Donnell (University of California, Berkeley) — Contingently Enigmatic Pictures and the Metaphysics of British Empiricism
• Meredith J. Gamer (Columbia University) — Taken from Life: Hunter, Rymsdyck, and the Anatomical Portrait
• Susie Beckham (Yale Center for British Art) — Illusion of Truth: The Im/materiality of Cayley Robinson’s The Close of the Day (1896)
• Clarissa Pereira de Almeida (USP Universidade de São Paulo) — Metaphysical Metaforms: Roy Ascott’s Love–Code–Cloud–Change

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Note (added 15 February 2026) — The original posting included a mistake the HECAA email address, I’m sorry about that, and it’s now been corrected above. –CH

From AWARE (Archives of Women Artists, Research, and Exhibitions):

Women at Work: Collections in Museums of

Historical Art through the Lens of Gender

École du Louvre, Amphithéâtre Michel-Ange, Paris, 16–17 February 2026

Sandra Gamarra, Milagros, ca. 2008 (Courtesy of the artist).

In 2014, the Musée du Louvre held a lecture series, entitled Women Artists at the Museum? Current Perspectives. Building on this line of thought, the present symposium moves beyond acknowledging the under-representation of women artists in permanent collections: through a combination of theoretical approaches and real-world case studies, this symposium aims to explore the epistemological shift that must occur for women artists to take their rightful place in museum collections.

Museums play a key role in society as spaces of knowledge and, by extension, of power. By rendering objects visible and inscribing them within cultural narratives, museums contribute to creating dominant frameworks and, through them, collective imaginaries. Scholarship in art history, museology and, in particular, gender studies, challenges the existing hierarchies among artists, artworks and techniques, and critically examines the conditions under which artists trained and worked. This feminist approach, which also draws on postcolonial theory, is driving change in museum practices. By focusing on the permanent collections of historical art, an area still less studied from this angle than temporary exhibitions and modern or contemporary collections, this symposium will explore museum initiatives that generate new ways of seeing and understanding. Many historical art museums have launched research programmes, experimented with innovative display strategies, and developed new narratives and modes of transmission.

Such work challenges evaluation criteria grounded in the established canon and pushes back on the enduring myths and misconceptions that continue to shape art history. This naturally gives rise to pressing questions: Can gender studies play a role in fundamentally reconfiguring museums? Does a radical approach necessarily lose its force when articulated within an institutional setting? What initiatives of this kind, both past and present, have already been carried out, and with what outcomes?

Organised jointly by the non-profit organisation AWARE (Archives of Women Artists, Research and Exhibitions) and the Musée du Louvre Museum Studies and Research Support Department, this international symposium (Elles sont à l’œuvre: Les collections des musées d’art ancien au prisme du genre) will bring together curators, academics, and artists working at the intersection of art history, museology, and gender studies, to harness the transformative potential that this interdisciplinary space holds for building the museums of tomorrow.

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9.30  Welcome by Françoise Mardrus, Musée du Louvre, and Camille Morineau, AWARE, MNAM-Centre Pompidou

9.45  Introduction by Griselda Pollock, Feminist Art Historian, Professor Emerita, University of Leeds

10.30  Session 1 | Mapping Presence: Revisiting Permanent Collections
Moderator: Chương-Đài VÕ, Curator, Writer, Editor and Professor, ENSAPC
• Annabelle Ténèze, Director, Louvre-Lens Museum
• Ilaria Miarelli Mariani, Director, Museum of Rome and the Municipal Museums of the City of Rome, and Ilaria Arcangeli, Researcher
• Fabienne Dumont, Art Historian, Art Critic and Professor at Jean-Monnet-Saint-Etienne University
• Gloria Cortes, Heritage Curator at the Fine Arts Museum of Chile, in Spanish with consecutive translation into English

13.15  Lunch break

14.30  Session 2 | Beyond the Fine Arts: Hierarchies of Genre and Gender
Moderator: Stéphanie Deschamps-Tan, Heritage Curator, Musée du Louvre
• Andaleeb Badie Banta, Andrew W. Mellon Senior Curator of Prints and Drawings, National Gallery of Art, Washington DC
• Manon Lacaplain, Director and Heritage Curator, and Camille Belvèze, Heritage Curator, Musée Sainte-Croix, Poitiers
• Liliane Cuesta Davignon, Heritage Curator, González Martí National Museum of Ceramics and Decorative Arts
• Iris Moon, Associate Curator, European Sculpture and Decorative Arts, Metropolitan Museum of Art

17.15  End of the first day

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9.30  Welcome by Carolina Hernández Muñoz, International networks project manager and coordinator, AWARE, and Matylda Taszycka, Head of Research Programmes, AWARE, MNAM-Centre Pompidou

9.45  Session 3 | Collections as Polysemous Spaces: Narrating Multiple Histories
Moderator: Clovis Maillet, Performance Artist and Medieval Historian
• Isabella Rjeille, Curator, Museu de Arte de São Paulo Assis Chateaubriand
• Stephanie Sparling Williams, Andrew W. Mellon Curator of American Art at the Brooklyn Museum
• Sandra Gamarra Heshiki, artist
• Pawel Leszkowicz, Art Historian and Professor of Contemporary Art and Curatorial Studies, Academy of Art, Szczecin
• Zorian Clayton, Curator of Prints, Victoria & Albert Museum

13.00  Lunch break

14.30  Session 4 | Networks and Transmission: Working Collectively
Moderator: Julie Botte, Musée du Louvre
• Charlotte Foucher Zarmanian, Art Historian and Research Director, CNRS (National Centre for Scientific Research)
• Laurien van der Werff and Magdalena Roosje Anker, Heritage Curators and Co-Chairs of ‘Women of the Rijksmuseum’, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam
• Noelia Perez Garcia, Research Director of El Prado en femenino, Prado Museum and Professor of Art History, University of Murcia, and Carlos González Navarro, Heritage Curator of 19th-Century Painting, Prado Museum
• Susanna Avery Quash, Senior Research Lead and Head of ‘Women in the Arts Forum’, National Gallery, London

17.15  Conclusion by Anne Lafont, Art Historian and Research Director at EHESS (School of Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences)

From ArtHist.net:

Reflections at Work / Le reflet à l’oeuvre

Institut national d’histoire de l’art (INHA), Paris, 22–23 January 2026

Organized by Anne Pillonnet, Marie Thébaut-Sorger, and Romain Thomas

How do reflections (both physical and depicted) and lighting influence our perception of artworks and their presentation? Art historians, physicists, digital specialists and experts in perceptual phenomena will gather to discuss this question at the international conference ‘Reflections at Work’. Jointly organised by the teams of AORUM project (Analyse de l’Or et de ses Usages comme Matériau pictural, XVIe–XVIIe siècles) and FabLight project (La fabrique de l’éclairage dans les arts visuels au temps des Lumières, 1760–1820), this event is part of an interdisciplinary research initiative that aims to promote a collective exploration of reflections, light, and their role in past and present aesthetic experience.

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9.00  Accueil des participants

9.10  Mot de bienvenue — Anne-Solène Rolland (INHA)

9.15  Introduction — Anne Pillonnet (Institut Lumière Matière, université Lyon 1), Marie Thébaud-Sorger (Centre Alexandre-Koyré CAK-CNRS, Paris) et Romain Thomas (INHA)

9.40  Session 1 | Reflection of Matter, Matter of Reflection
Présidence: Christophe Renaud (Laboratoire d’Informatique Signal et Image LISIC, université du Littoral Côte d’Opale) et Romain Thomas (INHA)
• ‘Alle de verwen van een regenboog vertoonend’ (« Montrant toutes les couleurs d’un arc-en-ciel ») : peindre l’iridescence de la nacre dans la nature morte néerlandaise du XVIIe siècle — Clara Langer (Laboratoire de Recherche Historique Rhône-Alpes LARHRA, université Lyon 2 /université de Constance)
• Reflets de matière, ce qu’ils révèlent — Anne Pillonnet (Institut Lumière Matière, université Lyon 1)
• La perception visuelle du brillant et des reflets — Pascal Mamassian (Laboratoire des Systèmes Percerptifs LSP, École normale supérieure PSL)
• Rendu des surfaces brillantes : entre réalisme physique et réalisme perceptuel — Samuel Delepoulle (Laboratoire d’Informatique Signal et Image LISIC, Université du Littoral Côte d’Opale)
• Peindre la lumière : les femmes, le portrait et la luminosité matérielle dans la Gênes du début de l’époque moderne / Painting Light: Women, Portraiture, and Material Luminosity in Early Modern Genoa — Ana Howie (Département d’histoire de l’art et d’études visuelles, université Cornell, Ithaca) (Intervention en anglais)

12.45  Pause déjeuner

14.00  Session 2 | Reflection on the Artwork: The Lighting Atmosphere
Présidence: Christine Andraud (Centre de Recherche sur la Conservation CRC, Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle) et Ralph Dekoninck (Faculté de philosophie, arts et lettres, université catholique de Louvain)
• Du bruit à l’extase, en quête de contemplation — Viviana Gobbato (Département Culture et Education Arc de Triomphe – CMN / Centre d’Histoire Culturelle des Sociétés Contemporaines CHCSC, université Paris-Saclay)
• L’art aux mains de la fée Électricité. Visiter le Salon la nuit (1879–1880) — Agathe Ménétrier (INHA)
• Capter le reflet, sonder la matière : dispositifs d’imagerie pour l’œuvre d’art et le corps humain — Mathieu Hébert (Institut d’Optique, université Jean Monnet Saint-Étienne)
• La lumière du jour comme source lisible pour les contextes spatiaux et visuels de la fin du Moyen Âge : la nef de la cathédrale Notre-Dame de Freiberg (Saxe) / Daylight as a readable Source for Late Medieval Spatial and Visual Contexts: The Hall Nave of St. Mary’s Cathedral, Freiberg (Saxony) (Intervention en anglais) — Lia Bertram (École des Beaux-Arts, Dresde)
• Le calcul des reflets — Christophe Renaud (Laboratoire d’Informatique Signal et Image LISIC, université du Littoral Côte d’Opale)

17.00  Conclusion de la journée

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9.00  Accueil des participants

9.20  Session 3 | Reflection in the Artwork: Symbol and ‘Off-screen’
Présidence: Martial Guédron (Laboratoire Arts, civilisation et histoire de l’europe ARCHE, université de Strasbourg) et Marie Thébaud-Sorger (Centre Alexandre-Koyré CAK-CNRS, Paris)
• Au miroir de l’armure — Diane Bodart (Département d’histoire de l’art et d’archéologie, université Columbia, New York)
• Quelques dispositifs réflexifs chez Philippe de Champaigne à Port-Royal de Paris : retour sur « une hypothèse saugrenue » de Louis Marin — Frédéric Cousinié (Groupement de Recherche en Histoire GRHis, université de Rouen-Normandie)
• Usages du reflet chez Clara Peeters, Pieter Janssens Elinga et Jean Siméon Chardin — Matthieu Somon (Institut de recherche Religions, Spiritualités, Cultures, Sociétés RSCS, université catholique de Louvain)
• Réfléchir les reflets dans l’emblématique du XVIIe siècle — Ralph Dekoninck (Faculté de philosophie, arts et lettres, université catholique de Louvain)
• « Une journée au XVIIIe siècle. Chronique d’un hôtel particulier » : Lumière sur une exposition — Ariane James-Sarrazin (Musée des Arts décoratifs)

11.55  Discussion

From ArtHist.net and KHI:

Archives Unbound: Time and Memory in Romantic Visual Culture

Palazzo Grifoni Budini Gattai, Florence, 2–3 February 2026

The Sarcophagus of Seti I at Sir John Soane’s Museum, engraved by Mason Jackson (Illustrated London News, 1864).

In the Romantic period, the archive was more than a repository of the past: it was a living site of imagination, reconstruction, and desire. Today, archives are again central to debates on memory, preservation, and the recovery of histories. In an age of information overload, media excess, and destabilising fake news, the archive has become a hotly contested field: as verifiable record (resisting distortion) and as partial repository (erasing as much as it preserves). Archives Unbound: Time and Memory in Romantic Visual Culture seizes this moment to discuss Romanticism in dialogue with European and global perspectives, asking how art historians can engage the past with rigour, ethical awareness, and creative scope.

The workshop is a collaboration between the University of Jena’s research group European Romanticism or Romanticisms in Europe?, the University of York’s Department of History of Art, and the Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz (KHI). Set against the backdrop of Florence—itself a city-as-archive—the event will examine the archive as both repository and dynamic system of knowledge, memory and power. The workshop coincides with The City as Archive, a major KHI exhibition juxtaposing historical photographs with contemporary works by Armin Linke.

Organisers
Elisabeth Ansel, Hannah Baader, Christin Bates, Costanza Caraffa, Johannes Grave, and Richard Johns

Organising Institutions
University of Jena, University of York, and the Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz – Max-Planck-Institut

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9.30  Introduction, Elisabeth Ansel and Christin Bates

10.00  Exhibition | The City as Archive
• Hannah Baader and Costanza Caraffa (exhibition curators)

13.30  Lunch Break

14.30  Session 1
• Michael Smith (York), John Flaxman’s Roman Archive
• Gemma Shearwood (York), Westminster Abbey and St Paul’s Cathedral as Archives of National and Imperial Memory

16:00  Tea Break

16.30  Session 2
• Mira Claire Zadrozny (Jena), The Archival City in Distress: Time and Memory in Images of Paris’ Ephemeral Ruins
• John Norrman (Jena), The Image of the Barricade: Illustrated Periodicals as Archives of a Social Practice of Imagining Crisis, 1848

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9.30  Greeting

9.45  Session 3
• Andrin Albrecht (Jena), Ludic Romanticism, or, the Five-Color Archive of Magic: The Gathering
• Kohta Nakajima (York), Metaphor as Fragment: Visualising Shakespeare in William Blake’s ‘Pity’ within Eighteenth-Century Reading Culture

11.15  Tea Break

11.45  Session 4
• Selina Kusche (Jena), Stories of a Single Figure? How Understanding History Paintings Requires a Mental Archive
• Jacob Bolda (York), Archives of Intimacy: The Portrait Miniature and the Romantic Subject

13.15  Lunch Break

14.15  Session 5
• Elisabeth Ansel (Jena), Fragmented Archives: The Manifold Aesthetics of Memory, Time, and Ecology in Ossianic Landscapes
• Christin Bates (Jena), Memories in Stone: Ruskinian Ecologies and Images as Climate Archives
• Kate Nankervis (York), ‘The Air Itself Is One Vast Library’: Atmosphere as Archive in British Romanticism

17.00  Final Discussion